By the time Elowen got home from the night market, the apartment smelled faintly of rain, dog shampoo, and the remains of the candle she had forgotten to blow out before leaving.

Sunny met her at the door with a tennis ball in his mouth and the wounded expression of someone who had been abandoned during a historic emotional crisis.

"I was gone for two hours," Elowen told him, kneeling to rub his face between both hands. "You survived beautifully."

Sunny sneezed on her sleeve.

"Yes, very moving."

She shut the door behind her and leaned against it for a moment, coat still damp from the mist outside. The night market lingered on her skin: lantern light, wet pavement, Lucien's hand closing around her wrist before she slipped, the quiet way he had looked at her afterward as if the almost-fall had offended him personally.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket.

Elowen didn't take it out immediately.

She already knew what it would be.

A message from Lumina, probably. Or a system reminder. Or Lucien waiting somewhere inside that impossible game, unaware that she had spent the evening with a man who shared his face, his name, and a gaze too attentive to be safe.

The thought made her throat tighten.

"Absolutely normal," she murmured.

Sunny dropped the tennis ball at her feet.

Elowen looked down at it, then at him. "You're right. We're not processing that tonight."

She kicked off her shoes, hung her coat by the door, and tried to return to the ordinary shape of her life. Tea. Laptop. Sketch files. Sunny's dinner bowl washed and refilled. The familiar glow of her tablet waiting on the desk.

Ordinary lasted exactly eight minutes.

Then she opened the latest draft of her webcomic and remembered why she had been avoiding it.

The next chapter needed a very specific visual reference: an old romance manga called When the Stars Fell. It had been one of the first comics she'd ever loved, the sort of dramatic, starry-eyed, emotionally excessive story that had shaped her entire understanding of longing before she was old enough to know what longing meant.

The panel she needed was in volume four.

Or maybe volume five.

Either way, she owned the set.

At least, she was almost certain she did.

Elowen stood from her desk and went to the bookshelf near the window, scanning through uneven rows of manga volumes, art books, notebooks, and paperbacks she had bought during various emotional emergencies. She checked the top shelf twice. Then the bottom. Then the storage boxes beneath her bed, which yielded three missing socks, a dried-out marker set, one Christmas ornament, and an old birthday card from Sofia, but absolutely no When the Stars Fell.

By midnight, her apartment looked as if a small but determined storm had passed through it.

Sunny watched from the couch, concerned but unwilling to intervene.

"I know," Elowen said, sitting back on her heels amid a pile of books. "This is humiliating."

She checked online retailers next.

Out of print.

Unavailable.

Sold out.

Used copies existed only in incomplete sets with alarming shipping fees and photos so blurry they could have been evidence in a paranormal investigation.

Elowen opened a secondhand marketplace app and searched again.

Nothing useful.

She tried the title with different punctuation.

Still nothing.

She tried a fan forum.

Several people replied within half an hour, all with variations of "I love that manga too!" and none with actual books to sell.

By one in the morning, she was sitting on the floor with her laptop on the coffee table, refreshing listings like desperation could summon rare media from the void.

"This is why artists develop back problems and trust issues," she told Sunny.

Sunny rested his chin on her knee.

She ran one hand over his head absently and refreshed again.

A new listing appeared.

Elowen froze.

The cover image was unmistakable: a blond boy beneath a star-filled sky, holding a dark-haired girl against his chest while meteors fell like burning glass behind them. The photo was clear enough to show the worn but intact corners, the original dust jackets, the soft yellowing of paper that made old manga feel strangely alive.

When the Stars Fell — Complete Set. Local Pickup Available.

Elowen stared at the screen.

Then she clicked so fast she nearly knocked over her tea.

The price was absurdly low.

Not suspiciously free, but low enough that a reasonable person would hesitate.

Elowen was not reasonable at one in the morning with a deadline creeping toward her like a tax collector.

She messaged the seller immediately.

Hi! Is this still available? I'd love to buy the full set if so.

The reply came almost instantly.

Available.

Elowen sat up straighter.

Amazing. Could I pick it up tomorrow? I'm local.

Another pause, barely long enough to count.

Tonight is fine, if convenient.

She glanced at the time.

1:07 a.m.

Absolutely not.

That was how true crime documentaries began.

Before she could type a polite no, another message appeared.

I can also leave it with building security.

Elowen's fingers hovered.

That was thoughtful.

Still, she checked the seller location, expecting some vague district marker across the city.

The app loaded slowly.

Then displayed the address.

Her building.

Her exact building.

Elowen stared.

"That's weird," she whispered.

Sunny lifted his head.

She clicked into the seller profile. No photo. No reviews. Newly created account. That should have settled the matter immediately.

Then another message arrived.

Apartment 402. Next door to you. I believe we've met.

Elowen's heart gave one startled, ridiculous jump.

Lucien.

Of course.

Of course the rare out-of-print manga she desperately needed belonged to the impossibly handsome neighbor who had taken her to a lantern market and remembered her coffee order and looked at her as if ordinary conversation contained secret weather patterns.

She should have found that concerning.

Instead, relief hit first.

Then embarrassment.

Then a strange flutter of excitement she refused to name.

She typed:

Wait, this is you?

His reply came at once.

Yes.

This is the most dramatic coincidence of my week.

Is that bad?

Elowen smiled despite herself.

Not for me. This book is about to save my entire chapter.

A few seconds passed.

Then I'm glad I kept it.

Something about that answer felt too neat, but she was too tired and grateful to examine it closely.

I can pick it up tomorrow.

I'm awake now.

Elowen glanced down at her pajama pants, oversized sweater, and the messy knot of hair threatening collapse at the back of her head.

No.

Absolutely not.

Then she looked at her tablet, the unfinished panel, the looming deadline, and the listing photo glowing on her laptop.

"Don't judge me," she told Sunny.

Sunny judged her immediately.

She stood, dragged on a coat over her sweater, and made a half-hearted attempt to smooth her hair in the hallway mirror. The result suggested a woman losing a custody battle with humidity, but it was one in the morning and Lucien had already seen her in worse emotional states, probably.

The thought made her pause.

Why did probably feel so accurate?

Elowen locked her door behind her and crossed the hallway.

Apartment 402 looked exactly like Lucien: controlled, quiet, expensive in ways that didn't ask to be noticed. Even the welcome mat was plain black, impossibly clean.

She knocked.

The door opened next second.